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Core Skills is advanced training consisting of 4 sequential sessions that help you learn the skills needed to become an effective EFT therapist. Each session focuses on the steps and stages, from assessment, working with cycles, effectively deepening emotion and facilitating the processes of withdrawer re-engagement and pursuer softening. Therapists work together to support each other to learn and grow their skills. You will leave the training with the skills and knowledge to be a more effective EFT therapist. The group is small – about 14 – and usually fills up, so registering early ensures a spot in the training.Please note: When registering, you are committing to the entire 4 session series. See session dates below. If missing a session is completely unavoidable, you’ll have the option to make up the session at the next CS series in Chicago or attend the missed session at a different U. S. location. The initial payment of $650 includes a $225 deposit that is credited to the final session. If you are paying for the entire series when registering, there is no deposit and you’ll receive a $150 discount on the series. Payment is made through PayPal. Visit the Core Skills info page for additional information on the training or call CCEFT at 847-491-6815. If you are unable to register because the event is full please contact Jeff Hickey at jeff@chicagoeft.com.

Session 1: September 8 & 9, 2017. Steps 1 & 2: Assessment, Alliance building and Tracking Cycles are the focus of the first Core Skills weekend. In addition to practicing the essential skills of reflection, validation and reframing that help enable couples to engage in therapy, we’ll study and practice the process of getting under surface content to help couples understand their interactional cycles. We’ll also practice assessment from an attachment perspective. The learning goals of this session are for you to have strong alliance building skills and proficiency in tracking your couples’ cycle – including complex and reactive patterns – in order to help them begin to de-escalate conflict.

Session 2: November 10 & 11, 2017 . Steps 3 & 4 De-escalation. This session is key in learning to access and expand the emotional vulnerability that have typically fueled cycles of conflict and distance. Key in this weekend are learning to recognize and develop the leading edge of painful emotions to help couples appreciate how vulnerability feeds negative cycles and to see their pattern as an attempt to deal with disconnection. Learning goals are 1) to recognize entry points for primary emotions, evoke and heighten them and place those vivid emotions in the context of the cycle, 2) to develop strong skills in placing interactions, emotions and conflict in lucid attachment language and 3) proficiency in setting up and processing stage 1 enactments.

Session 3: February 2 & 3, 2018. Steps 5, 6 & 7. Withdrawer Re-engagement. The emphasis here is on heightening and expanding attachment emotions core to Withdrawers’ experience and creating the powerful enactments key to becoming fully accessible , responsive and engaged – both with partner and self. This is the first of the two transformational stage 2 change events and paves the way for later pursuer softening. Learning goals include 1) heightening emotion in-the-moment with the use of strong therapist presence and vivid language, 2) creating and processing of powerful enactments with both partners, and 3) facilitating the Withdrawer’s clear expression of attachment needs.

Session 4: April 13 & 14, 2018. Pursuer Softening and Steps 8 & 9. The final weekend of Core Skills focuses on the Pursuer Softening process, the culmination of Stage 2 and the lead-in to Stage 3. Once again, we’ll be working on steps 5, 6 & 7 as we address the heightening and expanding of emotion to facilitate the vivid enactments that culminate in the Pursuer’s ‘softening reach’ and the re-engaged Withdrawer’s accepting and supportive response. We then wrap up with an overview of Stage 3, the consolidation and integration phase, when couples are supported to find new solutions to more pragmatic concerns and begin to create new narratives, characterized by experiences of increased trust, security and engagement.